Listening to President Donald Trump explain his rationale for launching a war against Iran is like listening to him explain any of his actions: an overconfident-yet-vague statement of the what’s at hand infused with hyperbole, quickly followed with self-aggrandizing promotion, then moving to berating reporters or political opponents and, lately, ballroom construction progress.
This introduction to Trump’s war of choice was followed by the fraternity-bro podium performance of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, which was followed by stammering remarks from several chief apologists, among them Secretary of State Marco Rubio and House Leader Mike Johnson. Yes, we’re neck-deep into the fetid dumpster of dumb.
Perhaps the only marginally honest answer to the “Why?” question was Rubio’s capitulation: “We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action,” he said on March 2, a day after the bombing started. “We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”
Huh. So, Trump, the guy who campaigned loudly decrying the “endless wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan, got played into one of his own. Even if Rubio is telling the truth, it was a stunningly inept statement from our nation’s top diplomat that, without providing context (he didn’t), feeds directly into the anti-Semitic conspiracy theories at the extreme ends of our political spectrum.
It’s incompetence from Oval Office through the cabinet, to be sure. As of this posting, the reason for the start of this war and the end goal change daily. Its impact gets messier: there isn’t a country in the crowded region that hasn’t been impacted militarily from this decision to bomb Iran.
None of this absurdity should be a surprise, of course. Just think back though this first year of the Trump administration (I know, a tall ask, as it feels like a decade). Elon, DOGE and Big Balls, random funding cuts (then panicked reinstatements), firings (then panicked rehires), chaos, Trump and his vapid VP stupidly berating Volodymyr Zelenskyy, chaos, Trump all but fellating Vladimir Putin, measles outbreaks, East Wing demolition, chaos, troops in major cities, ICE invades Minnesota and kills citizens, Venezuela. Sadly, that isn’t even half of it.
The mark of Trump’s entire second term is one of dictatorial legacy, including renaming federal buildings to include his own and hanging on them massive banners with his saggy likeness. Time is marked by the servile and/or bombastic pronouncements barked by department heads forcing on the public a false reality—lies and contradictions they can’t keep up with, and to which they no longer try.
Trying to write a reasonably thoughtful, timely commentary on anything in this ridiculous and often horrifying timeline is difficult—and I haven’t yet brought up the Epstein files.
But Trump’s actions in Venezuela and now Iran, which are further isolating us in the world, had me thinking back to the 2026 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland (that was not quite two months ago—feels like a year). Remember his “speech” (skeptical quotes intentional) delivered at Davos on January 21? Don’t bother listening. With his child-like pettiness regarding the Nobel Prize, his obsession with Venezuelan oil, and fascist tendencies at home (the invasion of Minnesota by 3,000 ICE agents on full display to the world) piled upon his usual grievances, expectations weren’t high.
Unsurprisingly, it resembled every Trump speech: more than an hour of rambling, bordering on incoherence, filled with lies and laced with insults, grievance and braggadocio. That is an objective assessment. If there was a “change,” it was that age has made whatever restraint that remained in his narcissistic brain disappear. From asserting that China doesn’t use wind farms (they are showrooms to sell the equipment to suckers, Trump asserted) to the US getting nothing from NATO (ignoring relative global peace and economic prosperity across the west for 80 years, not to mention being the beneficiary of the only time Article 5 of NATO’s charter was invoked after 9/11) to impersonating (badly and stupidly) France’s president. The only thing anyone cared to listen about was Greenland, of course, but even that was getting to be a moot point. With Trump’s chest-thumping about taking over the island nation that remains a Danish territory by force if necessary, stock and bond markets shuddered. And that’s the only thing Trump, and his equally corrupt aides, will take some care not to disrupt (too much). He backed down from his unhinged threat.
Overshadowing Trump was Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney. A day prior to Trump’s speech, he gave a searing speech delivered in classic Canadian form: confidently and calmly. The speech clearly assessed the faltering reliability of the United States:
“The old order is not coming back. We should not mourn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy. But from the fracture, we can build something better, stronger, and more just,” Carney said, and called for the “medium powers” of the world to stop being jerked around and forge a path forward, together, in the new reality.
And together, Europe, Canada and NATO-member nations clearly flipped Trump the bird regarding Greenland and his increasingly desperate-looking tariff bullying. Trump gave his two-hour harangue on Wednesday, and it landed like shit pouring from a cow’s ass: with a thud in the pasture. Within hours, of course, Trump claimed a deal was made after negotiations. The deal? Nothing. Simply a reiteration of what was already agreed to, decades ago.
Anyway.
With France’s Emmanuel Macron leaving the world stage due to term limits, Carney emerged from this year’s WEF as, possibly, the leader of the new “Western”-nation, middle-powers international order while the US convulses under Trump. And while Carney acknowledged the considerable challenge for Canada to diversify its economy to not rely on a single dominant trading partner, he also listed its advantages: namely, Canada’s ability to be self sufficient in all industries, from finance to agriculture to energy.
If the WEF accomplished anything this year, it was a wake-up all for those in attendance: the US, for the next three years at least and perhaps for a generation, is no longer a reliable partner. Its conduct with Iran is another thumping reminder.